"Lack of conmmunication"

I am the SENCo at a city school where engaging parents can be difficult at times as lots of our parents have English as a second language and lead very busy lives.

I have recently referred two children who need additional support in our school through the official routes, which as you know, takes a lot of time and effort from many members of staff.

The first child's mum has pulled away from support despite still struggling daily to meet her child's needs. Mum felt uncomfortable about having a SLT therapist in her house when she is not confident with her English. I had mentioned on the form that mum wasn't confident with her English and would need a translator, however the initial phone call was made in English and it wasn't mentioned that they would have a translator would be present. When I phoned through to speak about this the only answer was...mum can phone back and tell us shes changed her mind- a solution that still doesn't address mum's lack of confidence with English.

The second child's parent did engage and arrived for her meeting this morning, she waited for 10 minutes, after walking in the rain, and I phoned through to ask whether the appointment was going ahead. The person on the phone was very helpful and told me she would phone the Speech and Language Therapist for us to ask what was happening. We waited for a further 10 minutes to be told she was off sick, again the person on the phone was very apologetic. Mum had already rearranged work and set off in the rain to tell work she would be late again in a few weeks.

I really feel that communication with mum should have been made by the SLT team at the earlier possible opportunity, so that we won't have another parent who is put off by the whole process and I shouldn't be asked to pass on apologies on your behalf. 

I hope that changes in the way the system communicates with parents can be altered to support schools and parents.